An immigrants' rights activist who had rallied significant community support in recent weeks as he fought his own potential deportation, was arrested in Berkeley on Sunday for allegedly trying to steal several cars.

Longtime San Jose resident Guillermo Medina Reyes, 31, made headlines earlier this month after he rallied hundreds of supporters to a federal courthouse in San Francisco as he battled against his own deportation. Reyes was born in Mexico and brought to the US by his parents at age six, but his story is complicated by a criminal record — he served 10 years is prison for an attempted murder conviction when he was 16.

After being paroled, he spent another two years in an ICE detention facility before being released in 2023, with an immigration judge determining that he was not a danger to society.

That previous release, he and his immigration attorney argued in court, should be enough of a determination to save from deportation under the Trump administration's latest crackdown, however a federal judge has only given Reyes a temporary reprieve until an immigration judge makes a final determination on his status.

That determination was already complicated by a recent vandalism arrest, which his attorney attributed to a mental health episode. And Reyes may have been having another such episode on July 27, when he was arrested in Berkeley — as KRON4 reports, he was also taken in for a mental-health evaluation after that arrest.

The arrest on Sunday came after Reyes reportedly attempted to carjack several different cars on San Pablo Avenue in Berkeley, according to the Berkeley Police Department. The BPD tells KRON4 that, in one of the incidents, Reyes "approached a vehicle at the intersection of San Pablo Avenue and Jones Street, punched the passenger-side window, and attempted to open the vehicle’s door."

Multiple people in the area called 911 and Reyes was soon arrested.

After the mental-health evaluation, he was booked in to Berkeley City Jail. And on Wednesday, the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office charged Reyes with multiple felonies, including carjacking, vehicle theft, and grand theft.

As KRON4 notes, as a result of his arrest, Reyes missed a scheduled hearing on his immigration case, which had been set for Tuesday, July 29.

Given the high-profile nature of the case and Reyes's own activism, it seems highly likely that he will face detention by ICE if and when he is released. As KQED previously reported, ICE already appeared to have targeted Reyes because of the vandalism arrest in May.

Previously: San Jose Activist and Tattoo Artist Wins Brief Reprieve From ICE Detention, Judge to Rule on Case Thursday

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